Garage Studio/Practice Space *UPDATE**FINISHED*

[israelhands]

Just to get everyone caught up to speed http://johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic ... as#p122456
Needless to say I left the forum for a while (with my tail between my legs) and came up with a new plan on some stuff.

Ill start at the beginning - Two car detached garage about 20ft from my house and 50ft from neighbor. First order of business wass the overhead garage door and window. Framed both out with 2x6's then 1/5in mdf then a layer of 1/4 particle board then a layer of 1/4 weather treated "wall board" on the outside.

Then replaced the old cieling beams that were "sandwiched" 2x4 with 24ft long 2x10 and new 2x4 truses tying into the roof.

[israelhands]

then completely redid the electrical. 3 outlets on each wall long wall. 2 by where I put my desk. 1 by where I put the ac. 3 on the short wall. And also ran speaker wire in the ceiling for surround sound later on. Also Cable coming from the house.

for the electrical Im running a 50 amp breaker from the house. The breaker in the studio is made up of 6 - 20 amp breakers. Each wall is on its own breaker then the lights and AC each have their own as well.

[israelhands]

ok so then i had to figure out what I wanted to do on insulation. Big discussion on that on the old thread http://johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic ... as#p122456 but i ended up going with the spray foam insulation. It was half pound OPEN CELLED. And It worked out perfectly.

[israelhands]

Now it was drywall time. i went with 5/8 on the ceiling

also did flush lighting. currently have just regular flood lights up gonna upgrade to some led's so they wont put off so much heat

[israelhands]

then we were ready for walls. 2 layers of 1/2 with make poor green glue substitute. it was a 80% silicone based adhesive that dried really gummy kinda like green glue. it was called cellador i believe. i got it at lowes but the entire tube was in spanish so i don't really know much about it but it worked pretty good considering my budget.

Also redid the exterior door. originally it was an in-swing. got a new frame and door and made it an out-swing with new knob and lock and pick proof locks. then when it came time for the interior door i had to improvise. even though i didn't do the "room within a room" design I still felt it important to have 2 doors with a fairly big gap between the two. So of course i didn't have enough room on the exterior door's frame so i made my own makeshift frame of 2x6's and 2x4's. worked out really well actually but ill get to that later.

then after a big rainstorm there was some water creeping in UNDER the walls. at first i was freaking out thinking leaked from somewhere in the attic and ran down the walls. turned out that there was low spots on 3 of my walls on the outside. so when it would rain those low spots would fill up with water and come in between the foundation and my walls this was fixed my digging up a "trench" all the was around my exterior and filling it in with concrete and dirt. then i put up some rain gutters for good measure. havent had a problem since.

[israelhands]

as for AC and heat goes this was an internal debate inside of myself for months. originally i wanted to do a Mitsubishi mini split but later realized funds wouldn't allow it. so here is what i did...

When I covered the window when I first started i ran a 4 in pvc pipe horitonally through where the window was. that would later come to be my exhaust.

what I ended up using was a Portable AC. I draws in the stale air from the room and exhausts it through a 4 in hose while recycling some of the air back into the room (refrigerated). Now I just had to make a Silencer Box. my original design (pictured) was genius in my head but burnt up the motor in the AC within hours. So i had to open it back up and ran a 3 1/2in dryer hose through the "maze" of the box (not pictured). Works like a champ (so far) 4 months later

[israelhands]

ok so then moved on the texture, paint, floor.

Did a really thick chunky texture

For the floor I used this really thick heavy duty paint that is actually for outdoor decks. I asked for Jet Black but turned out with a little bit of a navy blue tint to it.

Walls and ceiling are both the same color. Supposed to be LIGHT GREY. as you can see it is a dark grey almost blue. If i could do it all over again Id do lighter colors as how the are now are way too dark.

[israelhands]

Built my Desk out of 3/4 particle board. nothing special pretty simple design i came up with just from looking at other desks online.

[israelhands]

Later painted my desk "Simpsons Yellow"

Also did base boards. Crown molding will have to wait till funds allow it.

[israelhands]

Now treating the sound in the room was another tough decision for me. little bit of a back story on that here http://johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=18406

I ended up with 32 - 1in panels of oc703. built me some frames, covered them in burlap and used a "tongue and groove" hanging method with 1 in gap between the panel and the wall i will proved more detailed pics of that if anyone wants them.

[israelhands]

Also made some "super Chunks" that went behind the suspended bass traps I can take pics of if anyone cares

[israelhands]

Sorry for the bad pics I didnt know they were this bad when I took them

[israelhands]

As you can probably tells I wrote all these posts in a hurry and without much detail. If anyone has ANY questions on anything i will gladly elaborate. this was just a quick "catch up" thread.

Allthough this is titled "finished" we all know im not. That being said, any and all questions comments and tips are welcomed. I know I did alot of things wrong and cut alot of corners but this was my first build and I dont plan on living in this house for more that 5 years anyway. This was my "practice" studio build.

It came out to exactly 500 days (to the day) from when I first started to what I considered a "finished" usable space. And grand total so far was $5,700. My budget going into this was $5k so i didnt do to bad (but im not DONE yet)

Had our first full band practice the other day and it sounded great in there. Neighbors said it was unnoticeable when we were actually playing. Right outside the door its kinda loud but if you walk down the driveway its barely anything and from the street you cant hear it at all. All the sound "escapes" out the door NOT the AC exhaust which i was Kinda surprised at.

The 2nd door was a solid core wood door that I will take pics of later. Still debating what else I can do to help the sound escaping there or maybe something in between the two doors. I do have alot of auralex panels left but they wouldn't help enough to waste them on this. any help welcome on this department.

All in all im very happy with how everything turned out. I would do lighter colors on the wall and ceiling. and then a couple other things.

like i said, all comments tips and criticisms welcome.

thanks

[israelhands]

Really?!?!?
Nobody has anything to say?!?!?
Rob?!?!? Come on man

[Soundman2020]

Great it's working out for you! A lot of effort went into that, clearly.

All the sound "escapes" out the door NOT the AC exhaust which i was Kinda surprised at. ... Still debating what else I can do to help the sound escaping there

Most likely that is your door seals, and that can be fixed fairly easily by replacing the seals with better quality proper acoustic seals. Take a look at the Zero International web site: they have the stuff you need to fix that.

... or maybe something in between the two doors.

Facing the doors with acoustic absorption will help a bit too, perhaps gaining you 5 dB or even more. But I'd bet that fixing the seals properly on both doors is going to make the big difference. Door seals are very often the problem.

I do have alot of auralex panels left but they wouldn't help enough to waste them on this. any help welcome on this department.

Plain old mineral wool of fiberglass insulation would do the job just fine. Wrap in fabric for aesthetics, just like you did with the wall panels.

- Stuart -